If you mean sex and gender, gender was used only used for classifying nouns up until around 50 years ago. At that point is when it was used by feminists to create a distinction between sex and gender (and as a means of identifying gendered social constructs), using it as a synonym for sex is more recent.
Sex and gender are still entirely distinct when it comes to medical science, psychology, neuroscience, etc.
(I may be missing another historical usage here, but it would be a modern use of ‘gender’ definitely. I think the timeline is about right though.)
Sex and gender are still entirely distinct when it comes to medical science, psychology, neuroscience, etc.
Not really. Binary trans people’s brains have been shown to more closely mirror the brains of people who were assigned their gender at birth, rather than the gender the trans person was assigned at birth. So trans women’s brains mirror those of cis women more closely than cis men, and vice versa for trans men.
Also, treating sex as the only one that is relevant in medicine is reductive and inaccurate. I appreciate that this might not be what you were trying to say (edit: it most certainly was not), but at the same time I am not sure what else you mean by “sex and gender are distinct in medical science”. Transition alters the body significantly and is medically relevant. As a trans guy, my voice, metabolism, hirsutism, and build/muscularity align with cis men much more closely than cis women for example.
I am not sure what you mean with psychology – why do you think sex and gender are distinct in psychology?
We’re going well past “these two words mean the same thing!” that I was replying to, probably because they deleted their comment. So there is missing context.
So trans women’s brains mirror those of cis women more closely than cis men, and vice versa for trans men.
Because sex is not a binary either. I’m not a geneticist, doctor, etc, but this is fairly well established AFAIK, showing that ‘male’ and ‘female’ are more akin to general groupings, with a degree of overlap, than any actual dichotomy.
As a sample reference:
https://cen.acs.org/biological-chemistry/genomics/Scientists-reject-binary-view-human/102/i33
To quote that example:
Gender and sex are closely related yet distinct concepts—sex is considered a collection of biological characteristics, and gender is considered a collection of socially constructed roles, behaviors, expressions, and identities.
Regarding the next bit from you:
Also, treating sex as the only one that is relevant in medicine is reductive and inaccurate.
It would be, but that isnt what I said, right from the quote you have of me:
Sex and gender are still entirely distinct
I never, at any point, said that only sex mattered in medicine. I said they were distinct.
I doubt it was your intention to do so, but youre putting words in my mouth. Please don’t misrepresent me.
Gotcha. Yes, I didn’t get to see the original comment.
I never, at any point, said that only sex mattered in medicine. I said they were distinct. I doubt it was your intention to do so, but you’re putting words in my mouth. Please don’t represent me.
TBF I did state quite explicitly that that was my own interpretation of your statement, not what you had literally said, because I couldn’t think what else you meant by that expression (possibly because of the missing context.)
I apologise for any hurt I have caused and will edit my previous comment, so as not to misconstrue yours.
showing that ‘male’ and ‘female’ are more akin to general groupings, with a degree of overlap, than any actual dichotomy
I totally agree.
Ok, i forgot about the sex. But here again, it means the act, the preferences for the act and the biological gender.
There’s no such thing as a biological gender, much like humans don’t have biological professions. No one is born a plumber, not even the Mario Brothers.
Here’s a decent primer if you’re interested.
https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/biological-sex-and-gender-united-states
